I will be going to London or Paris or both, and will travel from SFO, San Francisco

I have noticed that most first class seats are taken and business is all that is available, and based on what I have seen, first class would be too expensive, so if I was to fly business, which airline/plane is the best for comfort etc?

Thanks for any input, I dont know which airlines go to London or Paris from San Francisco other than the big ones I mentioned and United, British Airways, etc.

If you are going to London on DL, there are no direct flights from SFO. Your best option for comfort would be to fly SFO-JFK-LHR. SFO-JFK is on a 757 with recliner style seats and business elite service (i.e. same service/meals as international business). The seats are much better than domestic first class seats, but aren't fully lie flat. For the JFK-LHR segment, you will get DL's newer fully lie-flat seats on a 767-400 (most likely) or a newly updated 767-300.

If you are going to Paris on DL, then you'll be flying Air France. Their seats are newer, but are not fully lie flat. They do indeed go completely "flat", but aren't horizontal to the ground and will be at a slight angle. Some people don't like that, as they can tend to slide down if they move around. Food and service is pretty good on AF, and wine selections might be a bit better.

Others can comment on AA, but I'll do my best. But if you fly SFO-LHR, then it would be on British Airways which has a great product and direct flight. There won't be direct flights to Paris, so can fly AA to one of their domestic hubs (DFW, ORD, etc) in domestic first class, then get a decent seat but similar to Air Frances with an angled recline but flat seat. You can also do BA and connect through LHR for a nice product on the long haul.

Are miles or elite status a factor in your decision? Or only seat comfort and on board experience?

On DL, all LHR flights have lie flat seats. You'd have to fly via MSP, DTW, ATL, JFK, or BOS. SFO-JFK service is a modified BusinessElite service using the 752's with 16 recliner BusinessElite seats; IIRC, they plan to incorporate the 763's with lie flat seats on this route as well in June 2013 (LINK).

Wow, thanks for all the info...I might want to go to Manhattan for a couple of days of this trip from SFO so that might work out for Delta, but if British Airways, when I go to Seat Guru, it is difficult to figure out which is business, i.e. world traveler etc.

Seems the 747 is the plane BA uses for that direct SFO flight...

Miles arent an issue, i only have them with United due to where I live and while we go to Hawaii every year we have never been to Europe.

I could go to the BA forum, but if anyone knows, when I look at BA on Seat Guru, I cant be sure which is business, is it "Club World Class"? that seems to be the one that is one layer below first...

And I see the Air France plane would be the A330-220 and there again I can figure out on SG what business class is. Or the 777-200, but in both cases, not sure which is business

Wow, thanks for all the info...I might want to go to Manhattan for a couple of days of this trip from SFO so that might work out for Delta, but if British Airways, when I go to Seat Guru, it is difficult to figure out which is business, i.e. world traveler etc.

Seems the 747 is the plane BA uses for that direct SFO flight...

Miles arent an issue, i only have them with United due to where I live and while we go to Hawaii every year we have never been to Europe.

I could go to the BA forum, but if anyone knows, when I look at BA on Seat Guru, I cant be sure which is business, is it "Club World Class"? that seems to be the one that is one layer below first...

And I see the Air France plane would be the A330-220 and there again I can figure out on SG what business class is. Or the 777-200, but in both cases, not sure which is business

BA:
World Traveler = Economy
World Traveler Plus = Premium Economy
Club World = Business
First = First

Be warned that BA charges for advanced seat reservations even in business class and sets aside some good seats seats only for their own elites. I don't know the details, but I think the fee is about $150 per person per long haul segment, with BA (maybe AA too) elites being exempt. If you want an upper deck seat (good luck), or to be seated together, or to avoid rear facing seats, plan to pay.

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In regards to the JFK-CDG portion (if that's what the OP chooses and goes w/ DL), there's still one daily DL-operated flight on the 763ER w/ the cabin mod. J looked pretty nice on that but I can't speak from experience unfortunately (I was in EC on CDG-JFK and that was pretty good). AF J is also nice (got an op-up on an A330); they have good food and a fantastic Bordeaux (red wine). No Woodford though

-J.

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If you are going to Paris on DL, then you'll be flying Air France. Their seats are newer, but are not fully lie flat. They do indeed go completely "flat", but aren't horizontal to the ground and will be at a slight angle. Some people don't like that, as they can tend to slide down if they move around. Food and service is pretty good on AF, and wine selections might be a bit better.

Not all DL flights to Paris are on Air France. There are flights to CDG on Delta metal from MSP, ATL, DTW, SEA, CVG, JFK, ORD to name a few. Some cities, such as ATL and JFK, have flights on both AF and DL metal. The SEA and CVG flights have flat-bed seats in BE; flights from the other cities I listed do not have flat-bed seats.

It seems odd to me that CVG gets the flat-bed seats rather than one of the bigger hubs.